How we treat the least of us...

It is said that a test of character is how the most vulnerable are treated.  Being honest, we have to admit that we live in a society devoid of any character at all.  Sure, we hear now and then of isolated of individual heroism and sacrifice, and they not only make us feel human but give us hope that every one in need will be taken care of.  But the reality is, this is not the case.

We, all of us, have created a society, either by direct intent, apathy or ignorance, where in those who are the most vulnerable always bear the burden of the heaviest sacrifices to be made, whether that be economic, or even of life and death in war.  We enforce the avoidance of this reality with the insistence that, damn near every utterance of our political leaders, when discussing some aspect of America, is prefaced or qualified with the statement, "the greatest country in the world."

But it really doesn't matter who is in power, democrat or republican; the process template of all legislative action is always first do no harm, to the interests of the oligarchy.  In EVERY piece of legislation, nothing is passed that calls for any real sacrifices on the part of those at the top.  Sure, there is a lot of wailing over "paying their fair share," but rest assured that the "little bit more" the wealthy are asked to pay is the equivalent of most of us being asked to be lighter by a few pennies.  Meanwhile, sacrifices are demanded of the rest of us that usually carry significant consequences, in some cases even life and death.

Republicans don't even bother with the pretense any more of pretending to be for "working families." (when was the last time you heard them trot that chestnut out?) And, if we are being real, all the Obama happy talk of "hope and change" has its limits as well.  For the latest evidence, you need look no further than the recent fiscal cliff deal to see the ridiculous giveaways.  If anything, I hope he changes when it comes to negotiating!  When it comes to the 1%, addressing their wants is the priority, while the needs of the rest of us must be sacrificed.  That is the template, whether its democrats or republicans.

On the one hand, all this is written off as the "legislative sausage making," the ugly underside of how things get  done, e.g. is what it is.  Accepting that view is to accept the status quo and tacitly acknowledge that this is how it should be.  In other cases, you have those who can be counted on to say, after every "deal," that this was "the best that could be done." If you look at the political process as a sporting contest between democrats and republicans, its fitting.  We argue over who won and who lost.

But we avert our eyes from who the real losers are, even when in many cases, its us.  And we lie to ourselves, or readily accept lies in order to accept the status quo.

Take for example, the references to "reforming" social security.  You hear this from democratic and republican leaders, and that this must be done to "make sure the program is available for future recipients," and also to "deal with the deficit."  The facts are future recipients will be taken care of until 2036, at which time there will be enough in the trust fund to pay 75% of benefits without making some adjustment.  The other fact is, social security's funds have nothing to do with the deficit; its trust fund is, by law, separate from the general fund.

They want to "reform" social security by applying the so-called Chained CPI, a method of calculating future benefits.  By all accounts, this amounts to a cut.  Every other method of "reforming" the program has also been some form of a cut, including raising the retirement age.

Proponents of Chained CPI, democrats and republicans, crow about the billions of dollars this will save, but just know that when we are talking about saving money, this is money we are also talking about denying seniors.   Putting this in a wider context, what we are really talking about is denying thousands of dollars to senior citizens who are already squeezed to death trying to make it on an average social security income of $15,000 per year in retirement, to "save billions of dollars" that does not impact the deficit one way or the other.  So why do it?  Essentially we're saying: let's cut their benefits today, so we don't have to apply some solution in 2036.  It makes no sense at all.  Why not apply a solution today?

And there is a simple solution: raise the cap on payroll taxes used to fund the program.  Right now, for an individual, its $106,000 per year.  Social security is due to everyone, no matter the income, so why not raise it?  Here's an example of the impact:  I make more than $106K per year.  I hit that point about a 6 weeks or so before the end of the year.  The paycheck I get that is the first one that after I've made the $106K for a given year does not have any payroll taxes taken out.  The difference is negligible either way.  Why not raise the cap to address the shortfall?

And yet, this simple solution has been practically ignored, by both parties.  Instead we hear talk of making sure the poor and middle class have "skin in the game," which essentially speaks to the weird obsession by the political and wealth classes to not only have those at the bottom fund the excesses of the top, as we did with the bank bailouts, but also to make sure that we experience pain in return for the few crumbs that are left after they've taken yet another "share."

I have recently heard more discussion over raising the cap, including among some in the democratic party, but this simple solution remains a heavy political lift at this point, and because of that I don't expect more to stick their necks out for it.  And it is a heavy lift because here is a solution that is not favored by the oligarchy, those who pay for the political campaigns for both democrats and republicans.

We say we want to "reform" social security when we don't have the balls to admit that we want to cut the already meager benefits of senior citizens just to sate the warped sensibilities of the oligarchy who demand sacrifice for the sake of it.  And its not out of a sense of shame that the political class hide behind the Orwellian "reform" moniker, but expediency.

Mean Guns

This guy is absolutely nuts.  He couldn't have been a more perfect poster child for gun nuttery if he tried.

Even Glenn Beck, no stranger to insanity himself, had this to say about his fellow radio host and right wing moron:

Want to know who the media wants to make the face of the pro-gun argument in America?  Look no further than conspiratorial radio host Alex Jones, best known for his 911 truther theories and his love of Charlie Sheen's hernia.  Jones is the man behind the petition to deport CNN host Piers Morgan for his views on gun control.  Morgan invited Jones onto  his show to debate the gun issue yesterday, and not surprisingly, Jones made a fool of himself, giving the left the perfect poster boy for their attempts to paint every logical conservative as an extremist nut job.

"The media" didn't have to do anything; Jones does it all himself, providing us his own evidence that he is a raving lunatic, the last person any sentient being would want possessing a weapon.  On the one hand, one might think, being a radio guy, Jones is simply oblivious of optics and is just carrying out his on air radio schtick as radio hosts, lacking visuals, rely heavily on emotion and hyperbole to excite and in likely incite listeners.   On the other hand, Jones fit the mold of your typical, fearful, conspiratorial driven, far right partisan who doesn't go anywhere without black helicopters following overhead and "jack-booted government thugs" in the shadows behind every door and around every corner.  Everyone is out to get them.

But its scary to think that this is the kind of person who wants to "exercise" their 2nd amendment rights to own weapons.

Calling the Kettle Black...

For all their constant bleating about being "strict constructionists" when it comes to interpreting the Constitution, those who call themselves "conservative" today struggle mightily when it comes to divining the concept of religion in government and society as expressed by the Founders.  This is obliviousness on so many levels...

The creator of Kwanzaa is fighting back against a Wisconsin GOP state senator who said “almost no black people care” about the holiday and that it’s spearheaded by “white left-wingers” who want to separate the country. 

In a statement released last week, Sen. Glenn Grothman said, in part, “Why are hardcore left-wingers still trying to talk about Kwanzaa? Almost no black people today care about Kwanzaa, just white left-wingers who try to shove this down black people’s throats in an effort to divide Americans.”

Apparently unless you celebrate Christmas, you are "dividing America."

First of all, who is he to speak for black people?  I'll bet he doesn't even know any black people well enough to know what they think about it

I personally have only had one interaction with Kwanzaa, where once I went to celebrate  one of the days, umoja, at a local church.  It was a relatively innocuous, but overall positive experience.

The Kwanzaa founder said he developed the holiday, which celebrates family, community and culture, to reinforce the principles of unity, self-determination, collective work and responsibility, cooperative economics, purpose, creativity, and faith.

Of those black folk who I have known to celebrate it, most of them celebrated Christmas as well.  And yet, for all of the negative activities people could be engaging in, why would anyone spew this level of fear and vitriol over a non-threatening holiday that, according to the senator, "almost no black people care about?  Karenga has the goods on this fool:

Dr. Maulana Karenga, a Cal State Long Beach professor who created the African-American and Pan-African holiday in 1966, told CBS2's Rachel Kim that he doesn't take Grothman's rants seriously. 

“He has some issues he’s working out. Anxiety about what he considers is the multi-coloring of America,” Karenga said. “He’s suffering from falsehood, ignorance and misinformation in order to discredit not just me and Kwanzaa, but black people and their right to choose their own special culture.”

Yet Grothman doubles down:

In an interview with CNN, he defended his comments by personally slamming Karenga. “I think the underlying problem here is not enough TV types when they talk about Kwanzaa, talk about the horrible, racist, violent past of its founder. And if they knew the past, I think Kwanzaa would die a quick death,” Grothman said.

If that were the case then Christmas and much of what we call "culture" in this country would be deserving of a "quick death" as well then.  And speaking of Christmas, the problem here is that Christmas and Christianity, in the hands of people like Grothman, is perverted from what is loving by nature into something hateful and ugly.

And the supposed "racist, violent past" of Karenga pales next to the past of whites who came to this country, committed genocide on indigenous peoples to steal their land, then kidnap millions of Africans and enslave them to build out the country they stole and generate wealth that they've enjoyed to this day, helped along by the false construct that is race to control and maintain the entire thing for centuries.

Now that is evil.  And that's not opinion, but historical fact.  And yet it is Kwanzaa that is supposedly "dividing America."  What a loon!

This reminds me of a conversation I had with a black cab driver years ago when I had traveled to another city on business.  Heading up the local news for the day was a story of a black man who had committed murder.  Asked if I had heard about it, he then went on to shake his head and say, "the black man is the most violent creature on the face of the earth."

In that instant I had a brief stream of conscious thought about the Native Americans, the development and dropping of the atomic bomb, chemical weapons, of the untold millions killed in world wars I and II, of Hitler and Stalin, the Klan, of the genocides that had occurred in the former Yugoslavia, and in that brief instance I felt sad for this man who had obviously been brainwashed to a self-hatred so ingrained that it could be expressed indirectly in such a matter of fact way.

"Dude, have you considered what the white man has accomplished on the scales of violence?"

"Naw, dog, that's different," was the response I got.

Little wonder then, that the Grothman's of the world are so oblivious and quick to double down on their hatred and feel so comfortable in their ignorance.

We've come a long way?

I'm old enough to recall what it was like growing up as a black child in the 1960s, when racism was blatant and in your face, particularly in the South.  Stories told of the experiences of parents and grandparents drove home the outrageous absurdities and horror of racism that was common in the lives of many back then.

Even though I grew up in Washington DC, I eventually had that painful experience that was ultimately  inevitable for most black kids at that time, wherein one day the veil that is the innocence of childhood is lifted and the realization hits that, there is something different about you in society's eyes that makes you less than.  As much as you enjoyed and identified with the adventures and travails of the kids you saw on the various TV shows, all of whom were white, you came to realize that you were not like them, and different in society's view in a negative way.  And that's being charitable.

I used to run errands for my mom to stores in the business district around the corner from where we lived, and it made me uncomfortable and sometimes angry that whenever I went, I would be followed around in the store.  Eventually I realized this happened because they thought I was going to steal something, which didn't make sense to me.  My siblings and I were "raised in the church" so to speak, and the spiritual as well as earthly consequences of stealing was enough to drill home the point that, besides being wrong, it wasn't worth it.

One day, on an errand for my mom, I was cornered and questioned in a threatening manner by the store clerk, assuming I had stole something.  She did this in front of all the customers in the store.  I was more embarrassed than afraid, and in that instance, it hit me: they think I'm "stealing" because I'm black.  It took a lot of discussion and assurances from family to help me dig out from under that psychic ton of bricks.

One outcome of the civil rights movement was that blatant, open displays of overt racism came to be more universally shameful.   People still held racist beliefs and ideas, but this stuff became something that "decent" people didn't openly express in polite society, and it was relegated to private conversations of like minded folk.  Racism was still there, but became more subtle, and the unspoken but widely held implication as expressed by the majority was, out of sight of mind.

Relatively speaking, this didn't last long, as the social acceptance of overt racism came roaring back with the advent of the "conservative" movement during the second campaign of Ronald Reagan.  "Political correctness" was one of the earlier "freedoms" of conservatism that was celebrated, that had the effect of releasing the genie of open bigotry and making  it acceptable in the public sphere again.  A signpost along the way of this process was Reagan infamously opening his campaign in, of all places, Philadelphia, MS, the site of the murders of civil rights workers Schwerner, Goodman and Cheney.  The underlying racism of the conservative movement was plain, even back then. (And please note that here I am NOT calling all conservatives racists; they're not.)

Fast forward to today.  The public racism that was indulged in under the cover of political correctness in the 1980s seems almost quaint compared to the blatant and ugly racist incidents that have become commonplace today, like this, and this.  The frequency of the occurrence of these incidents, and the relatively laissaez faire nature with which they are treated in the media and society at large have put them on a path to becoming socially acceptable again.

And I have to admit, as jaded as I and many black folk have become regarding the natural inclination to expect that people's better natures will always shine through, the incidents that have occurred since the election of Obama as the first black president seem to drive home the point that racist ugliness will always be with us, that it is a feature of our national DNA, and that we as a nation will never achieve the level of egalitarian enlightenment, a feature of which would be the eradication of a tolerance of racism in the public sphere.  We instead appear to be moving in the opposite direction.

The advent of Obama and "hope and change" carried with it by implication that we had "come a long way."  I voted for Obama but I still did not believe America was ready for a black president.  On election day, even though it became clear as the day wore on, that Obama was on the verge of making history, many blacks felt that something, somehow, would happen at the last minute to prevent that.  After his victory had been certified and made official, I felt sad for many of my white friends who actually believed, that Obama's election somehow signaled that racism was dead.  How could a nation elect the most hated and feared talisman of embedded racism, a black man, to lead it, and still be racist?

Instead, it appears that rather than being a sign of enlightenment, the election of Obama appears more to have been the removal of a scab off a rancid, festering and infected wound, aggravated over time by lack of any serious remediation.  Rather than having "come a long way," more and more it appears that we are coming full circle.

These recent racist eruptions and incidents like them used to make me angry.  Resigned to the fact that "we've come a long way" is just something that is said to avoid dealing with the festering wound that is racism, we either laugh ruefully or just shake our heads.   These incidents say more about the hearts and "minds" of their instigators who seem to relish wallowing in this ugly behavior, and the obvious fear they have of the changes underway in our nation.

You almost feel sad for them.

Integrity at Cliff's Edge

Eight senators voted no on the fiscal cliff deal:

Tom Carper (D-DE)
Michael Bennet (D-CO)
Charles Grassley (R-IA)
Tom Harkin (D-IA)
Mike Lee (R-UT)
Rand Paul (R-KY)
Marco Rubio (R-FL)
Richard Shelby (R-AL)

While I can imagine it took some measure of courage for Carper, Bennet and Harkin to buck leadership and vote "no" on the deal, their reasons for doing so was based on standing firm on democratic principles.  

Harkin, in his speech on the senate floor explaining his vote, gives a brief but excellent history of why going over the cliff and back to the Clinton tax rates would not be such a bad thing for the nation.  Sure, the short term pain of taxes going up, and the removal of spending on consumption would have an impact.  Harkin reminds us all of how that could have easily been averted to head off the impact of going over.  Harkin reminds us what happened the last time we did this.

But more importantly, Harkin also questions the giveaways in the deal, and the approach taken for towards benefits for the wealthy, versus every one else.  Namely, that tax cuts and other benefits for the wealthy are made permanent, wherein benefits for middle class and working families, such as unemployment insurance, child tax credit, EITC and others are temporary.

The reality is this; our political system has been corrupted by money to the extent that those who are the most vulnerable are always first to suffer and sacrifice when it comes to resources.  Its easier for those in Washington, democrat or republican, to cut the benefits of senior citizens, than it is, for example, to adjust tax legislation to prevent corporations from getting tax breaks for shipping jobs overseas, but in some cases ending up with a negative tax rate.

When Harry Met Joe

As time passes, the dirty details and behind the scenes skulduggery of steps to a deal to avert going over the fiscal cliff are beginning to be laid bare.  And some of it is not pretty.

Reid and McConnell were negotiating, when Biden stepped in and replaced Reid in the negotiations:

Reid, the majority leader, had been negotiating and trading ideas with McConnell, his minority counterpart, since Friday evening. But the soft-spoken Nevada Democrat drew a bold line in the sand midday Sunday: He had no more counteroffers to give.

Reid’s office had suggested that another counteroffer would come in the morning, but the clock ticked to afternoon without one. Instead, Reid’s office told McConnell’s at about 1 p.m. that the majority leader was done with the back and forth. “At this stage, we are not able to make a counteroffer,” Reid announced soon after on the Senate floor. Reid was playing hardball. With polls showing that the public was far more likely to blame congressional Republicans than the president if the nation jumped off the fiscal cliff – and billions in automatic tax hikes and spending cuts went into effect – Reid rightfully knew that McConnell wanted a deal – and badly. Suddenly and irreversibly, the talks veered into a new direction. Within minutes, the Kentucky Republican was dialing up Vice President Joe Biden, elevating his old colleague to the Democrats' new negotiator-in-chief. It was the fateful decision that put the Senate and White House on the pathway to the deal eventually approved by the Senate and the House, ending weeks of drama over the fiscal cliff. It also left Reid standing on the sideline stewing. 

The game changed in midstream, and Reid's hardball playing apparently was not appreciated by leadership, even though the path forward Reid was taking was part of the previous marching orders.  The real slap here is that McConnell was allowed to go over Reid's head and get concessions that Reid apparently had rejected, in accordance with the game plan.  Nevertheless, Biden began his victory lap:

For Biden, it was a triumphant moment.  It was major compromise crafted with McConnell, following the two year extension of the Bush Tax cuts in 2010 and the debt limit deal in the summer of 2011.  Biden has earned the nickname "the McConnell whisperer" across Washington. 

I could get a dog to obey me just as well as the "dog whisperer" if I'm standing there with a t-bone steak in my hand:

The final package, which cleared the Senate in the early hours of 2013, also included concessions that Reid had refused, including a delay of the automatic cuts, known as the sequester, for only two months instead of at least a year.

Giving out goodies like this, of course the deal got done.  McConnell was at the end of his rope and desperate for a deal, since he knew polls showed all the blame was going to the republicans.    This concession is key though, because it puts the sequester right around the time the debt ceiling will need to be raised.

Biden has been mentioned as a possible presidential candidate in 2016, so this deal would be a good notch on his belt to have going in.  Getting deals done for the sake of the deal may fit the purpose of those making them, but they miss the larger point -- there are real people outside of Washington affected by all of this.

Sen. Tom Harkin, who voted "no," put it all in perspective with a speech in the Senate that laid bare the gist of all this horsetrading: cutting benefits and raising taxes of the working and middle classes, to pay for more breaks and giveaways for the wealthy.

Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, one of the eight no votes, has been one of the few to speak out publicly against the concessions that Democrats made to strike a compromise.  He complained that the administration traded permanent GOP-friendly tax policy -- the extension of tax rates for those below $450,000 for temporary Democratic priorities.  "In essence, this agreement locks in a tax structure that is grossly unfair to middle-class Americans," Harkin said in statement after the vote.

The Art of the Cave In

He done caved in, again.

The White House insists that, even though this deal leaves the GOP another bite at the apple to hold hostages again in a few short weeks over the debt ceiling vote, it doesn't matter because they will refuse to negotiate.  Next time.

I'm sure republicans must have split their sides laughing at that one.  

Obama follows an easily discernible pattern.  It goes something like this:  

1.  Rally democrats, progressives and others on an issue.

2.  Go around talking tough about "fighting for you" and not yielding.

3.  Send up trial balloons of various cave-ins, disguised as attempts at "reaching across the aisle" or  "bipartisanship."

4.  Marginalize allies as "the far left" when they catch on and question the deviation, in some cases engaging over the top attacks.

5.  Begin publicly negotiating with himself.

6.  Give away the damned store.

7.  Declare victory.

There really isn't much the right has to do but sit back and wait for victory to be handed to them.  To stave off boredom or dying from laughter, they spend their time playing with the President as a cat plays with a mouse, accusing him of being underhanded, "not serious," a socialist and hating America.  The cat doesn't have to worry about going in for the kill, because in this case, the mouse is sets himself down before him, on a silver platter.

And even though we've been through this several times, its still difficult to watch Obama prostrate himself before an ever rabid far right that never stops hating him.

Its been like this with negotiations over the stimulus, health care reform, the debt ceiling and now the fiscal cliff.  Everybody including the blind, deaf and dumb recognizes this pattern.  Obama insisting that he won't yield on the debt ceiling in order to get people to accept his cave in now on that point is a prelude to step 1 in the process.

Suspended Economic Animation

A deal has been brokered by Biden and McConnell to avert the cliff.  It passed the Senate just before Midnight.

Now its up to the House to pass and send the bill to Obama to sign, or reject.  Even though passing the bill will put the nation on the right side of the cliff's edge, given that republicans canned Boehner's extremist "Plan B," there is no assurance what the House will do with this deal.  There are signs that the natives are restless:

"Some GOP lawmakers, including Reps. Phil Gingrey of Georgia and and Tim Huelskamp of Kansas, told CNN Tuesday they won't support the bill."

"'It's taxing, and still taxing, small businessmen and women, and I don't like that at all,' Gingrey said, referring to some small business owners who would be among those whose tax rates rise."

Looking at the details, the President gave up a lot to get this deal with republican leadership.  Most importantly, the GOP retains the ability to take the hostage show on the road again in just a few weeks over the debt ceiling limit.

Democratic leadership is saying this is not a problem, as they insist that (this time) they won't allow the nation to be held hostage again by the GOP.  However given the precedent that's been set by the President, in reliably caving on issues he previously says are sacrosanct, there is no reason for anyone not to believe that caving is a feature versus a bug with this President.  

There is a lot of teeth gnashing anger on the left over the President caving yet again.  I don't like it either.  Some are demanding that progressive lawmakers put the kibosh on the deal.  Cooler heads are counseling that, in essence, given the rigid extremism of the right, gerrymandered districts and the 2.1 million unemployed held hostage, this was the best that could have been expected, and they may be right.

Technically, we're over the cliff right now, as the deal has yet to become law.   Given the fact that the fiscal cliff is an entirely unnecessary construct, and the fact that the debt ceiling makes even less sense, the cartoonish nature of this entire useless episode is obvious.  We're Wile E. Coyote in suspended animation phase, in mid air over the cliff but are yet to realize its implications.  Sometimes, in his pursuit of the elusive Roadrunner, ol' Wile E is able to make it back to the edge of the cliff, only to have the ledge break off underneath him.  

Exactly where we are vis a vis the edge and disaster, its too early to tell.  But for now, the nation is in suspended animation.